Table Of Content

Third Edition Techniques & Principles in Language Teaching Diane Larsen-Freeman and Marti Anderson Great Clarendon Street, Oxford 0X2 6DP Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide in Oxford New York Auckland Cape Town Dar es Salaam Hong Kong Karachi Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi New Delhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto With offices in Argentina Austria Brazil Chile Czech Republic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore South Korea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam OXFORD and OXFORD ENGLISH are registered trade marks of Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries © Oxford University Press 2011 The moral rights of the author have been asserted Database right Oxford University Press (maker) First published 2011 2016 2015 2014 2013 2012 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 No unauthorized photocopying All rights reserved. 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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The authors and publisher are grateful to those who have given permission to reproduce the following extract of copyright material: p.214 Screenshot from Facebook (http://www.facebook.com). Reproduced by kind permission of Facebook. Sources: p.215 www.wikipedia.com; p.205 The British National Corpus Illustrations by: Chris Pavely pp. 26, 38, 53, 56, 72, 87, 89, 106, 118, 135, 153, 172, 183, 188, 193. This title originally appeared in the series Teaching Techniques in English as a Second Language, edited by Russell N Campbell and William E Rutherford (First Edition 1986; Second Edition 2000). In memory of my parents, Elaine and Randolph Larsen, with heartfelt gratitude for their love and encouragement DIANE LARSEN-FREEMAN In memory of my mother, Mavis Anderson, and in honor of my father, Elmer Anderson, who both inspired me to be curious and compassionate MARTI ANDERSON Contents Acknowledgments List of Acronyms To the Teacher Educator 1 Introduction 2 The Grammar-Translation Method 3 The Direct Method 4 The Audio-Lingual Method 5 The Silent Way 6 Desuggestopedia 7 Community Language Learning 8 Total Physical Response 9 Communicative Language Teaching 10 Content-based Instruction 11 Task-based Language Teaching 12 The Political Dimensions of Language Teaching and the Participatory Approach 13 Learning Strategy Training, Cooperative Learning, and Multiple Intelligences 14 Emerging Uses of Technology in Language Teaching and Learning 15 Conclusion Glossary Index Acknowledgments We thank the readers of the first and second editions of this book. Your invaluable feedback and input have helped to shape this third edition. The approach we have used in this book, as in the previous two editions, is based on our experience in teaching the methods/approaches course at the Master of Arts in Teaching Program at the School for International Training. This book would not have been written in the first place if it had not been for the influence of colleagues and students there. We are indeed grateful for the time we spent in this wonderful community. Marti would like to thank Diane for being an inspiring teacher and mentor as well as beloved colleague and friend. Working with her on this project has been a great privilege. Diane would like to thank Marti for her willingness to join her in this project and her ‘can-do’ attitude throughout. Diane is counting on Marti to make this project her own and carry it into the future. We wish to thank our life partners for their encouragement and support. For the initial faith they showed and for their continued encouragement and helpful suggestions, Diane acknowledges with gratitude the editors of this series, Russell Campbell and William Rutherford. It has also been a pleasure working with the professionals at Oxford University Press. For this edition, we want to acknowledge Julia Bell’s helpfulness especially, and Ann Hunter’s and Keith Layfield’s skillful copy-editing. In addition, this book has benefited from the fact that leading methodologists and colleagues have generously responded to requests for feedback on portions of this manuscript, either the previous edition or the current one. We are indebted to Earl Stevick (To the Teacher Educator), Shakti Gattegno (Silent Way), Georgi Lozanov, Allison Miller, and Tetsuo Nishizawa (Desuggestopedia), Jennybelle Rardin and Pat Tirone (Community Language Learning), James Asher (Total Physical Response), Marjorie Wesche and Ann Snow (Content-based Instruction), Elsa Auerbach (Participatory Approach), and Leo van Lier and Mat Schulze (Technology). Their comments have made us feel more confident of our interpretation and representation. Any errors of interpretation are entirely our responsibility, of course. List of Acronyms ALM Audio-Lingual Method BNC British National Corpus CBI Content-based Instruction CLL Community Language Learning CLT Communicative Language Teaching CALL Computer-assisted Language Learning CLIL Content and Language Integrated Learning ELF English as a Lingua Franca LCD Liquid Crystal Display SLA Second Language Acquisition SAARRD Security, Aggression, Attention, Reflection, Retention, and Discrimination SIOP Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol TL Target Language TBLT Task-based Language Teaching WL Whole Language ZPD Zone of Proximal Development To the Teacher Educator The Work of Language Teaching The work of teaching is simultaneously mental and social. It is also physical, emotional, practical, behavioral, political, experiential, historical, cultural, spiritual, and personal. In short, teaching is very complex, influenced not only by these 12 dimensions and perhaps others, but also requiring their contingent orchestration in support of students’ learning. When language teaching in particular is in focus, the complexity is even greater, shaped by teachers’ views of the nature of language, of language teaching and learning in general, and by their knowledge of the particular sociocultural setting in which the teaching and learning take place (Adamson 2004). Indeed, research has shown that there is a degree of shared pedagogical knowledge among language teachers that is different from that of teachers of other subjects (Gatbonton 2000; Mullock 2006). Nonetheless, each teacher’s own language learning history is also unique. The way that teachers have been taught during their own ‘apprenticeship of observation’ (Lortie 1975) is bound to be formative. There is also the level of complexity at the immediate local level, due to the specific and unique needs of the students themselves in a particular class at a particular time, and the fact that these needs change from moment to moment. Finally, the reality of educational contexts being what they are, teachers must not only attempt to meet their students’ learning needs, but they must also juggle other competing demands on their time and attention. Because of this complexity, although this is a book about the methods and methodological innovations of recent years, we do not seek to convince readers that one method is superior to another, or that there is or ever will be a perfect method (Prabhu 1990). The work of teaching suggests otherwise. As Brumfit observes: A claim that we can predict closely what will happen in a situation as complex as [the classroom] can only be based on either the view that human beings are more mechanical in their learning responses than any recent discussion would allow, or the notion that we can measure and predict the quantities and qualities of all … factors. Neither of these seems to be a sensible point of view to take. (Brumfit 1984: 18–19) After all, ‘If it could be assumed that learners were ‘simply’ learners, that teachers were ‘simply’ teachers, and that one classroom was essentially the same as another, there would probably be little need for other than a technological approach to language teaching’ (Tudor 2003: 3), with adjustments being made for the age of the learners, specific goals, or class numbers, etc. However, the truth is that Learners are not ‘simply’ learners any more than teachers are ‘simply’ teachers; teaching contexts, too, differ from one another in a significant number of ways. In other words, language teaching is far more complex than producing cars: we cannot therefore assume that the technology of language teaching will lead in a neat, deterministic manner to a predictable set of learning outcomes. (Tudor 2003: 3). Tudor goes on to observe that this is true even within a given culture. It cannot be assumed that all teachers will share the same conceptions of language, of learning, and of teaching. Rather than the elegant realisation of one rationality, then, language teaching is likely to involve the meeting and interaction of different rationalities. Murray (1996) is therefore right in drawing attention to the ‘tapestry of diversity’ which makes our classrooms what they are. (ibid. 2003: 7) Language Teacher Learning Recognizing the complex and diverse nature of the work of teaching has stimulated much discussion during the last 15 years around the question of how it is that language teachers learn to teach (Bailey and Nunan 1996; Bartels 2005; Burns and Richards 2009; Freeman and Richards 1996; Hawkins 2004; Johnson 2009; Tedick 2005). In addition, during this same time period, the journal Language Teaching Research began publication with Rod Ellis as its editor. Much of the research reported on in these sources can be summed up in what Johnson describes as her current understanding of language teacher learning: L2 teacher learning [is] … socially negotiated and contingent on knowledge of self, subject matter, curricula, and setting … L2 teachers [are] … users and creators of legitimate forms of knowledge who make decisions about how best to teach their L2 students within complex socially, culturally, and historically situated contexts. (Johnson 2006: 239) Such a view has radically transformed notions of teacher learning. As Richards (2008: 164) notes: ‘While traditional views of teacher-learning often viewed the teachers’ task as the application of theory to practice, more recent views see teacher-learning as the theorization of practice.’ Rather than consumers of theory, then, teachers are seen to be both practitioners and theory builders (Prabhu 1992; Savignon 2007). Given this view of teachers as theory builders, teacher education must serve two functions: ‘It